Kingfish Posted September 18, 2002 Share Posted September 18, 2002 …And the 6th army surrendered long before Feb ’43? Would it have meant disaster for 1st Panzer army? At the time of operation Uranus the 1st Pz was several hundred miles to the southeast, deep in the Caucasus. Could they have retreated through the Rostov bottleneck before the Russians closed the bag? And what about the Russians? If the pocket had collapsed a considerable number of Russian units would have been freed to reinforce the drive towards Rostov. Could the Russians have employed these units in time and in sufficient strength to make a difference, or was their C & C not flexible enough to take advantage of such an unexpected opportunity? Could Manstein’s army group ‘Don’ have held them off? If not, what options would the Germans have had? 17th army was already withdrawing across the Kerch straits, could the rest of army group ‘A’ do the same? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nidan1 Posted September 18, 2002 Share Posted September 18, 2002 When you say "long before Feb43", it would be important to discuss how long before that time, since weather would porbably be the prime factor in all the issues you propose. Since Uranus and subsequent encircling operations took place in the dead of winter in the January February time frame, I am sure the Russians planned to localize the bag to the 6th Army, while establishing postions from which to repulse a breakout or a relief attempt, which is exactly what happened (except there wasnt really a concerted breakout attempt). If things were changed and the encirclement occurred before the dead of winter, the Russians may have coupled it with an offensive further west, or downward into the Don Basin. Interesting speculation though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lindan Posted September 18, 2002 Share Posted September 18, 2002 the question is: what would have happened if the 6th army had broken out. according to my sources this was possible till early-mid december. it could have proven disastrous for the southern wing though. but probably anything would have been better than this desaster. a real tragedy. I read a lot about this topic, with many first-hand accounts. the suffering, hope, resistance and will to live is overpowering. reading this while you know that they all will die in the end is heart-breaking. [edit cause I can't spell] [ September 18, 2002, 12:19 PM: Message edited by: Lindan ] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grisha Posted September 18, 2002 Share Posted September 18, 2002 The Soviets had no idea they had encircled 300,000 Axis troops. They thought the pocket only contained 90,000. It was a serious Soviet intelligence failure, and resulted in the lose of a large number of Soviet units who were needed to reduce this huge pocket. The encirclement and reduction of German 6th Army (and a major portion of 4th Panzer Army) did much to curtail Soviet plans to exploit the situation operationally. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PiggDogg Posted September 19, 2002 Share Posted September 19, 2002 Guys, A number of years ago (maybe very late 80s or early 90s), S&T Magazine had a game in the magazine called "Fortress Stalingrad". It was a corps (Russkie) and division (Germie) level game that covered from the Russian initial thrust through the surrender. Usually the S&T games were pretty historically correct as simulations. This game had a good historical feel, and I felt it was good as a simulation. As a result of that game, two large impressions were obviously presented. (1) The initial thrust was launched on nearly a shoe string. If I remember correctly, the spearhead forces were 2 mech corps & one tank corps. They took a big chance and hit the jackpot. They did a really good job and the Germans cooperated. (2) If the German 6th Army had attempted to break out early in the encirclement, they almost for sure would have broken out with substantial loss to both sides. However, the bulk of the 6th would have gotten out. I might pull that game out of the game closet and revisit the simulation and situation. Cheers, Richard [ September 18, 2002, 07:18 PM: Message edited by: PiggDogg ] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andreas Posted September 19, 2002 Share Posted September 19, 2002 I believe that it would have had to collapse quite a lot earlier (at least two months) to have that effect. The overstrength 6th PD arrived at Tatsinskaya and Kotelnikovo from 28th November. According to Raus, the failure of the Red Army to interfere with its deployment in the next ten days was quite critical. It is probably fair to say that once 6th PD and the other reinforcements arrived and had deployed, the chance for the Red Army to break through to the Sea of Asov and cut off the Germans in the Caucasus was gone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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